From Perdition
by Mirrordance
Summary: Dean deals with memories of hell with drug and alcohol abuse, and a late night conversation with a hesitant angel in a crappy motel bathroom: You took away the scars.Why couldn't you have taken away the memories too? Castiel pulls Dean out of another hole


Author:Mirrordance

Title:**From Perdition**

Summary:Dean deals with memories of hell with drug and alcohol abuse, and a late night conversation with a hesitant angel in a crappy motel bathroom: You took away the scars. Why couldn't you have taken away the memories too? Castiel pulls Dean out of another hole.

**Note**:

**Thanks to all who read and especially lots of love to all who reviewed **_**Your Own Medicine**_: purrtygurrl101, Tacpebs, MKofGod, Zuimar, Rhesa, Yuimi, Naed, fearlessgoddess2, SherryDarling, x-littleang-x, Meggin Lane, Amy, and:

Aranna Undomiel: Wow, you'll have a rollercoaster of a catch-up, but I can promise you the upcoming seasons of _Supernatural_ will only make you love it more.

Phoebe (You're absolutely right, haha, I can totally imagine Sam as being overboard and a little overly methodical)

deangirl1: You're so right about Jensen's acting; there is a weird, unquestionable difference to his carriage as Dan and as himself. I remember Kripke or someone making a comment about his performance in that season 3 episode _Dream A Little Dream_ who said that he played two kinds of Deans and even at a glance, you knew which was which each time. That was amazing. This was also emphasized to me when I saw that crazy _Eye of the Tiger_ viral genius and the moment he ended the gag and was laughing, he looked entirely like someone else. He's amazing.

jjackles: Hey, don't worry about not reviewing. I'm totally resigned to the idea that people are busy with a lot of other things. I'm just glad to share and glad for the people like you who drop me a line once in awhile. I hope all is well now and that my writing gives you some entertainment and relief sometimes :)

PipkinTwo: I totally agree with you, haha, the fics now are just so serious, and I think I joined the bandwagon with _From Perdition_ haha.

You guys rock! Hope you enjoy this one too. C&C's always welcome!

Without further ado: _From Perdition_.

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**From Perdition**

" " "

Dean got the drugs from a man named David Calling.

David was a thin, neat man - patrician hair, a barely-there gray-peppered beard, short-cropped and matching the shade of his light skin, almost-not noticeable on his face – normal dude, really, almost forgettable. David was a widower, with three grown-kids who had settled in other parts of the country. He kept a small, clean apartment in Brooklyn, living off of his pension after he was unceremoniously fired for having, _apparently_, lost his marbles.

Sam and Dean Winchester stood by his door because, like the owners of many homes the brothers have stood before, he had seen a ghost.

"We want to talk about the accident a month ago," Sam had said, in that clipped, 'FBI' voice of his, fake tone matching his cheap suit.

David let them into his house, and Dean remembered thinking that the space looked as neat as the man, and it really was quite unfair how people thought a decent guy like this had lost his mind or worse, this guy actually believing them.

Calling had stiffened noticeably, and his shoulders stooped in some kind of defeat. "It was all my fault."

Dean was reminded of many other people they've run into in their line of work, thinking they've lost their minds. Or, if one were to reach real deep and much closer, he imagined how his own father must have felt when their mother died the way she did, how alone he must have felt, if he had ever doubted his eyes and his mind.

_"Tell us what you think happened," Sam said, almost gently, and Dean wondered if his brother was thinking the same thing._

_"I've been seeing things," Calling said, "It was all my fault."_

_"Tell us what you saw," Dean amended, _Not what they told you to think_._

_David looked at him suspiciously, catching the distinction._

_"I've been taking medicine for it," David said, "Makes me feel all funny, but it calms me down. M' wife died a month ago, you see. Maybe that's why I've been seeing things. I'm glad they got me out of the job. I really coulda killed somebody."_

He hadn't very forthcoming at first, but the brothers had alternately implored and coerced, and the story inevitably unfolded.

_"M-my therapist said I should stop d-dwelling on it," David said, the stammer beginning immediately after he started thinking about what he had seen, "And-nd that p-people shouldn't en-enable m-me b-by ind-dul-dulging my fantasies."_

_Poor bastard_, Dean had thought, more and more believing that there was an honest to goodness case there, that this guy must have honestly, honestly seen something, and was suffering with reconciling what he knew to be absolutely true with what society was trying to force-feed him.

They went through the rest of the interview the usual way. David stammered through his story, and there was truth there somewhere, hidden between what people told him he couldn't have possibly seen, and his own self-doubt.

On their way out, Dean just... stumbled into the drugs, really. He had a dull, nagging headache. Sleepless nights plagued by nightmares of hell tended to do that to a guy. He was theoretically lucky getting away with just that, but sometimes... sometimes, he doubted.

He went into David Calling's bathroom because he was feeling oppressed, mildly nauseated. He was exhausted, he was sick for the poor guy, and _damned_ but he just needed an aspirin or something. He opened the medicine cabinet, and David Calling's prescription pills kind of just winked at him, orange, unmistakable plastic containers.

When he palmed the pills, he did not take them for himself. As a matter of fact, using them had been out of the realm of possibility.

He and Sam had exited David's apartment side by side, and he was rubbing at his nose, anxious for the aspirin he had eventually found elsewhere in that bathroom and ingested to take effect.

_"You okay?" Sam asked._

_"Yeah," Dean replied._

_"You sure?" Sam pressed, "You spent a lot of time in the bathroom in there."_

_Dean had stared at him in disbelief._

_"What?" Sam asked._

_"You're really creepy, bro."_

_"Dean..."_

_"Yeah, yeah," Dean said, waving a weary hand at Sam, "I'm fine. Poor bastard. He's starting to believe he's crazy. I found his meds. Swapped them with my Tic-tacs."_

_Sam choked on the breath he was taking. "Dean--!"_

_"He needs to go easy on the hardware, bro," Dean said, "Somewhere in that head of his, he knows that he's not crazy."_

_"He'll taste the mints, dude," Sam pointed out._

_"It'll keep him clean for an hour," Dean argued, "While he goes somewhere for a refill, maybe he'll figure out he's fine. We just gotta give him a shot."_

_"You're out of your mind."_

_"That's what they said about dad, you know," Dean said, wistfully, "Right up 'til he realized he just had to learn to put up and shut up."_

The pills sat forgotten in a dented container of Tic-Tacs in Dean's duffel bag for days. Days, just sitting there in the dark. But the case they were on was a difficult one. It was one of those cases, the ones that tended to leave behind scars, the ones you never talked about or bothered to recall. The kind of case where there was no sense of victory. It was just a really, really long, deep pothole on the road you had no choice but to go over.

Cases involving, say, monsters and claws and fur, those were semi-okay. Straightforward bad guys, black-and-white, that was fine. Physically demanding, sure, but that was how they rolled. Cases that involved troubled ghosts, victims of crime, dead kids, broken dreams... those were much, much trickier. This case had been both types all in one, and fought in the hardest terrain he and Sam had ever been in. He hated being underground. Rightfully reminded him of the Pit.

The first time he used the pills, Sam had left to buy them dinner, leaving Dean to his own devices, which lately was just not a very good thing.

_He couldn't calm down. His heart pounded in his chest, hard-pounding, like near-to-bursting pounding. He couldn't make a proper breath, and every time he blinked, he could feel heat, he could hear himself screaming, and he could smell rotting flesh._

_The smell was oily, and lingered, and the barest remembrance of it was nauseating him, taking him back again, down to the stifling darkness and the screams and the burning. He started shaking, and he cussed at his inability to control himself._

_He dashed to the bathroom, eyes raking for air freshener, cologne, disinfectant, alcohol, fucking lighter fluid, _whatever_, anything at all that could cover up that goddamn stench. He threw open the medicine cabinet on the mirror hanging over the sink. It was empty._

_The smell was taking over the room. The screams inside his head was getting louder. He was beginning to feel hot all over, like fire was licking at him._

_He went on his knees before his duffel bag, dug around with his hands for his aftershave, cologne, toothpaste, whatever the hell he could get his hands on first. His finger closed around something small and plastic. He snatched it up victoriously, not caring what it was, as long as it took away the smell and killed off the memories._

Fucking Tic-tacs!_ He realized with a growl, tossing it back in the bag spitefully, until he remembered that they weren't mints in the container at all..._

_Breathing hard, dizzied by his predicament and by the danger of the potential solution, his shaking hands reclaimed the container full of pills. The pills he had taken from Crazy David Calling's bathroom, the pills the old man took to calm himself down._

Maybe_, he thought, _maybe just one. Just one, and just this one time_._

_He shoved a pill in his mouth before he could think about it more. He dry swallowed it with a wince, and closed his eyes as if it could make the medicine work faster. He counted to calm himself, opened his eyes only when his breaths started to come easier, and the elements of the world suddenly felt like they were a veiled screen away, making him feel fully-aware but vaguely detached. Even the sickening smell that made him panic in the first place felt distanced from him._

Just one_, he told himself, _And just this one time_._

It had been a lie.

One had become two, and two became twice in a day, and then two at a time each time. And then he matched the cocktail with a drink. Because hell was a nag. Because you can take the boy outta hell but never the hell outta the boy.

He was fucking _tainted_.

Tonight, Sam went on a supply run.

And Dean was left to his own devices, which was _decidedly_ not a good thing _at all_ anymore.

Dean went on his knees in the bathroom, trying to get rid of a _fucking_ overdose. Because when pill number two numbed him but still let hell in, he grabbed a bottle of whiskey and pill number three, before he remembered that wanting to forget didn't necessarily mean he wanted to fucking _die_.

"You pray to this god more than to your Father."

He'd have jumped if he had the juice. But he had fingers to his tongue, trying to inspire his gag reflex, _busy_, you know. Maybe next time. Or maybe he was just getting used to Castiel appearing out of nowhere, unannounced, like he owned the place.

"What?" Dean asked him breathlessly, confused, drawing his fingers out of his mouth and looking up at the angel, standing by the closed door of the bathroom.

"One has heard of the term: porcelain gods," Castiel replied, holding his distance, tilting his head at Dean in appraisal.

Dean narrowed his eyes in further confusion. Blinked once, twice, before it finally hit him, and he shook his head in amused dismay. He laughed without spirit, but his eyes must have lightened, even a little bit. Because he was tired, and he was ill, and still he found it honest-to-god funny too.

"Cas," he tsked, "Correct me if I'm wrong. Did I just," he paused for mocking effect, "Did I just sense a sense of humor?"

Castiel's lips tightened. Dean couldn't tell, really, but it could have been a grim smile.

"Our Father equips us as the situation demands," Castiel explained, "As is needed. Around you, I find that it is a preoccupation I can be familiar with."

"And it dies as quickly as it appeared," Dean grunted, shoving his fingers back into his open mouth, warbling his words, "How tragic."

His stomach clenched and he gagged, and he indulged it, but all he hacked out was air. He groaned miserably, before sighing in frustration and sitting heavily on his rump on the cold floor. He eventually remembered to feel some unease that the angel was just watching him in that impenetrable, unflappable way. Pensive, mostly patient, observant. Unhesitating. It took him awhile, but he was loopy, _so there_.

"It's impolite to stare," Dean rasped at him.

Castiel pursed his lips, appeared to have come to a decision. He stepped forward, and squatted before Dean.

"What are you doing?"

"What's it look like?" Dean snapped, irritable, "I think I made a mistake and I'm getting rid of it." He threw up his hands in frustration, "I'm not doing too good a job, unfortunately. But I don't think I'm gonna die, 'cos you're here now. So I'm tired, I'm sick, and I'm not even gonna bother anymore."

"You won't die," Castiel confirmed, mildly, "Because I'm here. But that is not the question. What are you doing, Dean? To yourself?"

"What's one more sin, what's one more vice," Dean replied, irreverent, almost sing-song, because he really didn't feel like talking about this right now.

"Hey, Cas," Dean said, changing the subject, "I tried to kill you, right? Did I hurt the guy you're riding? Did I kill this dude?"

"We have saved souls and bodies much more far gone, Dean," Castiel said, looking at him pointedly.

"So you have," Dean murmured, looking away. He cleared his throat, and his voice was louder, more pretentiously jovial and confident when he looked at Castiel again. "That's what I thought. I was kinda worried, but I'm glad. Wouldn't wanna harm the accountant, or whatever he is. I think he's an accountant. He looks like an accountant. Is he an accountant?"

Castiel looked at him thoughtfully, let him ramble. For one reason or another. He looked like he made another decision again, and sat cross-legged on the tile, the position looking oddly graceful on him, made him look like an attentive child.

"The guy," Dean said, "He asked to do that, right?"

"Yes," Castiel replied, "He wished to serve the Lord."

"I," Dean hesitated, "I didn't ask. For anything."

"No, you didn't," Castiel confirmed.

"And," Dean gulped, and damn it all but the fire and the smell and the screams were making their way back to every blink and dark again, "And I topped it all off with... with all that shit I did. How... how could..." he took a deep, shaky breath, trying to gather his thoughts.

"An accountant," he probably wasn't but Dean's head was stuck on it now, "An accountant asks to serve right? I guess some people get whatever the hell they pray for. I never asked to be saved. And I made... made myself even... even less, because of everything I've done down there. I don't... I can't make sense of it. Why I deserve another chance. Why I get pulled out. How could... how could I possibly be..."

"Worthy," Castiel finished for him, apparently and finally taking pity on the futile quest for a decent, representative word.

"Yeah," Dean winced, "Yeah."

He cleared his throat, uneasy, because there was a pit in his stomach and a lump in his throat that kind of just crawled its way there.

"Not the first time this happened either," Dean grunted, shifting, "Something always somehow saves me. But then again you knew that. People died, trying to save my unworthy ass too. How many of 'em have to die for me to live, huh? Maybe I should just let the damn pill and bottle take me after all, before I up the count, huh?"

"How many of them have to die for you to believe you are worthy, Dean?" Castiel countered, "And raised from hell, no less. Is there anything that can make you believe?"

"I don't know," Dean admitted, rubbing at his aching head, "I can't think. I can't think anymore. Or maybe because the answer's nothing. The souls I broke apart... I tore into 'em. Just... _tore_ into 'em. I can hear them in my head. I can smell them. Nothing can clean me up. I just wanna stop. I just wanna sleep."

He laughed at himself. "I'm so gross, lately. I can't fucking sleep, right? The only time I could was if I kinda just... drop. Like, suddenly, no one's home. And I'm in bed with all my dirty clothes on. It was the only kind of sleep I got and some nights, I get lucky and I don't even dream. That is," he patted at the container of pills in his jeans pocket, "That is until I got my hands on these babies."

"What are you going to do, when they run out?" Castiel asked him.

"I got me some prescription pads," Dean said, "And I got bad handwriting. Match made in substance abuse heaven."

"Your brother is worried about you," Castiel said, playing the Sam-card because everyone knew that was exactly how to get whatever they wanted out of Dean Winchester.

"I'm worried about me," Dean snorted, before shifting, more seriously, "I uh... I almost fucked up, out there. I was so jittery, I was just screwed up. The medicine – and you gotta believe me, that's exactly what they are – you know what they say... they take away my pain, and they help me do my job. What else can anyone say to that?"

"You are killing yourself, Dean," Castiel told him, plainly, "This cannot go on any more and any further."

"What?" Dean joked, quoting him, mimicking the angel's dead-serious delivery from one of their earlier exchanges, "Stop it? Or you will?"

"Dean..." and he sounded so weirdly, uncharacteristically helpless, didn't he? Brows furrowed, the angel pursed his lips again, and again came into one more decision. He leaned forward, and touched Dean's shoulder insistently, right where his hand had once made an imprint on Dean's body. Both of them caught the distinction, and maybe Castiel was working on pulling him out of another hell here...

"I cannot tell you to be strong," Castiel said, "Because we both know you are. Stronger than any human I have come to know. I cannot tell you to have faith, because the time for that will come on its own. I cannot insist on your worthiness, because that is something you have to understand yourself. I cannot tell you all is well, or that this will just pass, because you have a right to feel pain for your suffering, and the suffering you have inflicted."

"So you're absolutely useless," Dean said.

"What I _can_ do," Castiel said, ignoring the jibe, "Is tell you to be kinder to yourself. Give yourself time. Let yourself be helped. You were gone for a lifetime. Too many changes below, too many changes up here. You cannot expect yourself to be the same; to be just as unfazed, as fit, as fearless. If you are weary, rest. If you are ill, stop. If you stumble, let people catch you. If you fall, let them give you a hand. If your mind is shaken, speak of it, let yourself be heard, and let yourself be consoled.

"Life cannot be this," Castiel finished, looking around the miserable bathroom.

"I guess I just..." Dean hesitated, and the damn lump was still in his throat, closing it up, choking him from the neck up, and that must be the only reason his eyes were watering.

"I mean you've taken away all the damn scars," Dean said, shakily, "Why couldn't you have taken away the memories too? How any more fucking hard could that one last, little part be?"

"All scars come with a lesson, don't they?" Castiel asked, "This, the one in your head. This is the one that is most worth your remembrance in your second life. You have been hurt. Worse, you have hurt others. And now you are here, working in a way I have not seen on others of your kind before, working so that others would not be subject to the pain you had. And further, making up for the pain you caused. And we both know there are few forces in the world stronger than a man on a search for redemption, which, I must say, you have now become."

"In short you needed a sinner," Dean said, distastefully, rubbing his face wearily, and Castiel's hand should already be paying for rent on that space he hasn't freed on Dean's shoulder.

"We needed a warrior motivated to an unparalleled degree," Castiel said, "There is a difference. You are driven by fear and guilt and love. There are few who have all these forces within them. All that you lack is faith, but that will come too."

"I'm just so tired," Dean said, voice low, just a little bit broken. His mind was hurting from this conversation.

"And so you must rest," Castiel said simply, booking no arguments as he rose effortlessly to his feet. Dean looked up at him blearily, unable to follow.

"I can't," he said, "I got all this shit inside me, I gotta get rid of it, or I might never wake up."

"You will not die," Castiel promised, "Because I am here."

"I can't sleep anyway," Dean admitted, "I got all this shit in my head--"

"I too, can help on that score."

Dean looked at him skeptically, before a thought formed in his mind. "Wait a second. Those times... those times I just fall on my face asleep, and I'm just in deep and not dreaming. You have anything to do with that?"

Because angels weren't always visible, were they? And because _this one _in particular had a habit of knocking people out harmlessly, not to mention had a thing about bugging Dean about sleep.

The angel was gonna plead the fifth on that one. He kind of just looked at Dean in a bemused, sort-of benevolent way, that gave up so little that it gave up everything, really.

Dean just shook his head at him in dismay. "Next time, wait until I've showered and changed or something."

Castiel just shrugged, and offered Dean his hand to help him rise.

_Grip me tight_, Dean thought, _Raise me from perdition_...

"I'm sorry," Dean said with a grunt, when he took the offering and levered himself up. He swayed, and sagged against – he figured now – his quiet guardian.

"You are always sorry," Castiel said, gripping Dean by the elbow in support, "In this instance, I am hard-pressed to discover for what."

"You dudes are busy," Dean said, "The seals are aplenty. Your brothers have fought and died. Are maybe fighting and dying. And you're helping out a drunk druggie in a crappy bathroom."

"No task is too large for the Lord," Castiel said, unlocking the door and leading the two of them out, "That means there is no task too small. No man too insignificant. There is no man unworthy of His attention."

"Not even me," Dean said, sounding sarcastic.

"Not at all," Castiel murmured, sitting him down in bed, and gently pushing him to lean back.

Dean let him. He was tired, and maybe he had to give this receiving help / talking like a girl about his feelings thing a shot. Keeping his hell-shit to himself hasn't worked, after all. Getting into some other guy's drugs didn't help much either. What the heck. One of these days, he might even work his way up to talking about all of this at length with Sammy.

"Wait," Dean said, as Castiel made to put his hand upon Dean's face. He fished around in his jeans pockets, and drew out the Tic-tac bottle.

"Get rid of this, will ya?" he asked, "Please. Before I change my mind."

"What of the liquor?" Castiel asked, taking the bottle.

"Do I look like a fricking saint?" Dean said, grinning at him rakishly.

Castiel smiled at him tightly, as in some sort of acquiescence. He did not look surprised or offended.

"I'll try for less," Dean resolved.

"Good night, Dean," Castiel said, quietly, looking down at him.

"Thanks, man," Dean said, closing his eyes as Castiel pressed a hand to his forehead.

The darkness sucked him in at once.

It empty, sure, but at least it was quiet there.

THE END

November 22, 2008

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**AFTERWORD**

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**I. **_**From Perdition**_** Part of a Larger Fic**

_From Perdition _is actually a part of a larger action/adventure story I'm working on called _Underworld_. I liked this scene, and wanted to write a fic about how Dean is struggling with his memories, like a war veteran with post-traumatic stress as they say, or survival guilt and a whole bunch of other issues, so I decided to just launch this part of the fic as a stand-alone. _Underworld_ is about 40 pages long now, but I don't believe it's ready to be posted yet, so I've been holding back. In the meantime, I felt that _From Perdition _could stand on its own for now, and the time felt right to release it, after the hell-revelations of the past few episodes. I hope I was right to assume that one doesn't need to read the rest of _Underworld _to be able to understand _From Perdition_.

**II. The Title**

Of course the title is from Castiel's now-classic line, "I'm the one who gripped you tight and raised you from perdition." I liked the idea that he was pulling Dean out from another hell, so I stuck by that.

**III. The Characters**

**Dean** is my preferred one of the brothers, I know I've mentioned this many times before, but most of my writing concentrated on some kind of a conflict with Sam instead, whom I found much more complex, conflicted, intriguing and therefore much more exciting as a writer. So season 4 rolls around, and suddenly this heaven-hell thing has my Catholic schoolgirl-ness captivated, haha, and stories from Dean's perspective – like _Tightrope_, start popping up.

So, as per always, you know I address potentially arguable character aspects in my Afterword, and I guess the questionable Dean characteristic in _From Perdition_ is drug use. Well season 4 has shown him guzzling hard liquor like he ran on it, so I guess I just took it to the next step. I'm not sure many would agree, but the drinking, plus Episode 10's wishing he didn't feel a damn thing, plus the right opportunity (finding the pills, stashing them to help a guy, and then becoming so plagued he eventually uses it) – I figured it might be interesting to write the possibility. Also, I remember watching the TV series _House _and how it had once justified substance abuse: the unconventional character (and one of the best, most intriguing ones to ever be put on the history of television, I think), says that it takes away his pain, and helps him do his job. I heard that and I was like, how the hell can anyone argue with that? It's so tricky, this business with addiction. I am of the firm belief that it is wrong, but I would be at a loss to answer Dr. House, haha. Bottom-line: I just got Dean off of them in _From Perdition_ because he realized he should not write-off other less harmful ways of dealing with his suffering, like asking for help, or talking about it.

Anyway, as I watched the episodes where Dean drinks, I wonder what the angel who saved him would feel about it, though, so of course, this fic featured **Castiel** too. After _Tightrope_, I discovered I really enjoy writing him verbally spar with Dean.

I've said it before and I'll say it again. I am very pleased with the inclusion of this fascinating new character and the actor is doing a brilliant job. The detached ethereal-ness in _Lazarus Rising_, which he followed up with the avenging-angel sort-of danger he depicted in _Are You There God... _and_ In the Beginning, _and then the almost-human accessibility in _The Great Pumpkin_... It's such an amazing, sympathetic character.

**IV. The Next Project/s**

I think I have an emerging tradition of never-posting whatever I preview, haha. But I am almost done with this one, so I'm thinking it should come out in a week or so. Anyway, I wouldn't hold my breath, but just in case you are interested:

Author:Mirrordance

Title: **Talk Me Down**

Summary:Sam had just left for Stanford and Dean is running himself to the ground. John is now on the most important job of his life: hunting down and fixing back what's left of his eldest son.

Dean finished in two frenzied days' work that would have been done by more men in more time. Bobby thought he could keep the kid a week at least, but the work was clean, impeccable, careful, downright _inarguable_. When John had once said that Dean was his perfect soldier, he could have just as easily said that he was the perfect mechanic too. Hell, John could have said perfect cook, because Dean took to that task every night with gusto also, even if he barely ate anything that he made.

The kid was bursting out of his skin, Bobby reflected, darkly. Dean was cheery, sure, made the usual wise-ass remarks, made Bobby laugh more times than he had in the last few months put together. But his eyes dulled sometimes, looking at Bobby's books and the corner he said Sam once sat on with legs outstretched, and he kept sleeping on a thin blanket in the living room floor, skipping the empty sofa he had always yielded to Sam when they were younger and stayed over.

"I'm used to it," he had grunted that first morning, when Bobby woke up to find the uncanny sight.

He doesn't talk about Sam leaving, or Stanford or the entire West Coast, for that matter. The one time Bobby brought it up, Dean had joked and cleverly skipped the answer. Bobby made a note to keep his questions to himself next time and thought they were good, but he woke the next morning to find that Dean had worked all night and the restoration was almost done, like he was just dying to get out of there, away from more prying questions of stupid old junkmen who didn't know any better.

"I got another truck coming in a couple days," Bobby said, when he sensed that Dean was trying to say goodbye to him over breakfast, "I could really use your help."

Dean arched an eyebrow at him, and looked as if he was going to call him out on it, but he bit his tongue and spared the both of them the embarrassment.

"Yeah?" he said instead, stretching his arms over his head. He yawned, and it ended in another light cough.

"That doesn't seem to be letting up," Bobby said, pretending to be distracted by the newspaper he was reading, knowing too much fuss usually sent the kid crawling up the damn walls.

"Fricking dust bowl," Dean muttered, shaking his head, reaching for a glass of water. The two of them have this conversation once a day it seemed, "I'm not sick."

"I'm just saying," Bobby said, "That hunt was what, a week ago?"

"I told you I still keep finding dust in holes and cracks," Dean told him with a mischievous smirk.

"Yeah, yeah, so you did."

Dean tapped his spoon and fork together, shook his leg anxiously, "So what, that job coming up in a couple of days, you said? How long? Two? Three days?"

_As soon as I call in a favor somewhere, yeah_...

"You in a rush?" Bobby asked.

"Dad might want me somewhere," Dean said.

"If he wanted you somewhere," Bobby said, "You couldn't stop him from dragging your ass there even if you tried. When'd yer daddy ever been bashful, huh? You sit tight here, keep an old man company, he'll holler when he wants to."

"I guess," Dean said, not looking entirely sold on the idea. He tapped his utensils against his plate, before catching himself and putting them down.

"I think I'll wash the dishes," he declared.

"You do that," Bobby encouraged, looking up from the daily, and finding that there was still a good amount of food on the table.

"You eat like a girl now," Bobby commented, trying not to sound too worried.

"You kidding?" Dean asked, as he put the used plates together, "I ate most of it."

"You gotta eat more, Dean," Bobby looked at him pointedly and said nothing else about it. By the way Dean evaded the look, he knew he didn't have to.

"I said I'm fine," he mumbled and walked to the sink, and started washing the dishes, his back turned to his host, not seeing Bobby's worry, the creases forming on his forehead.

"I got a thought," Bobby said, "Seein as we're both havin a ball here, I'm gonna up and call yer daddy, have him join us. Is that stellar or what? I think I can afford to feed the two of you since you started eating for half a person."

The water splashed on, but the movement of Dean's hands stilled, and the squeak of the sponge and towels against the plates stopped with them.

"You sick of me now too?" the delivery was pitch-perfect, a disgustingly perfect, well-practiced joke. But Dean's hands didn't start moving, and his shoulders were stooped, and he wouldn't look Bobby's way, and damned if it wasn't an honest-to-goodness question.

The newspapers rustled as Bobby decisively put them down. "Dean, I'm gonna say this 'cos it needs sayin--"

"It was just a joke," Dean told him, turning this time, smiling, but they crinkled and hid his eyes, "I know you're crazy about me." He turned back to the plates, saying, "Bobby, geez, take it easy. Relax."

" " "

Dean decided to leave while the welcome mat was still more-or-less rolled out.

He snatched up a hard core cup of coffee and then flew off in his car.

A scant couple of hours after driving away from the Singer yard in the dead of the night, the dull headache he's been nursing for the last few days made him pull the car up to the first motel he could find when the lights started to explode from behind his eyes, like blinking, drifting after-images that blocked his vision in random spots. He didn't want to have to kill someone on the road, or end up wrapped around a tree. Or worse, surviving, and having to call up his father to say he had wrecked the car.

The light-flashes were obscuring corners of his vision, narrowing his sight. He kept bumping into things, like the ledges of the door to the office, a potted plant on the desk that he almost didn't get to catch in a save.

He wasn't unfamiliar with the pain, he's had bad headaches before, _everyone _in the modern world must have had it before, and twice or thrice as often than the usual if you're a Winchester. Once more because they were overworked and occasionally overwhelmed. Twice more because they were unlucky. Or maybe the caffeine he had was just crashing. Or he thinks he may have forgotten to eat. Or something. _Whatever. _He needed to stop somewhere until he could see straight.

To be continued...

Thanks for reading. C&C's as welcome as always. 'Til the next post!


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